/*
 * MessageFactory.java    0.0.1    08/dic/2009
 * 
 * Copyright (c) 2009 mentalsmash.org
 * 
 * Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
 * you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
 * You may obtain a copy of the License at
 *
 * http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
 *
 * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
 * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
 * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
 * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
 * limitations under the License.
 *
 * The use of the Apache License does not indicate that this project is
 * affiliated with the Apache Software Foundation.
 */ 
package org.mentalsmash.tazio.transparency.interfaces;

import java.io.Serializable;

import org.mentalsmash.tazio.transparency.commons.messages.TazioMessage;

/**
 * A MessageFactory is a class with the task of encapsulating an input {@link Serializable} 
 * object into a {@link TazioMessage}.
 * <p>
 * This encapsulation is done for two main purposes, the first one is to have only 
 * standardized messages passing throughout the network, thus allowing an uniform access to 
 * their information, the second one instead is the idea of relieving the upper layers of 
 * the task of assigning sequence numbers and {@link TazioNodeID}s every time a new message 
 * is created.
 * </p>
 * 
 * @version 0.0.1	08/dic/2009
 * @author Enrico Savioli <savioli.enrico@gmail.com>
 */
public interface MessageFactory {

	/**
	 * This method encapsulate a {@link Serializable} object into a {@link TazioMessage}, 
	 * assigning it a sequence number and a {@link TazioNodeID}.
	 * 
	 * @param payload	the {@link Serializable} that has to be sent, which will be 
	 * 					encapsulated inside a {@link TazioMessage}.
	 * @return			the {@link TazioMessage} containing the payload passad as input 
	 * 					parameter.
	 */
	TazioMessage encapsulateMessage(Serializable payload);
	
}
